Gaming: A Lifelong/Family-tastic Affair

As far back as I remember, I have been a gamer. While not quite my earliest memory, a closer runner is the Saturday mornings of my youth in Texas. I would wake up before everyone else to watch cartoons, as befits being that sort of age (well, and this age too. Anyways *cough*). However, I was not permitted to watch G.I. Joe for some reason. To fill that half an hour, I’d boot up the Atari and make a splendid botch of Pac-man and Galaxian and the like. When Nintendo came onto my radar in the late 80s, I was devoutly sure that I had been good enough for Santa to hook me up. And he did, though not just me alone. So I’d fight my siblings and parents to play Tetris, and Dragon Warrior, The Legend of Zelda, Faxanadu, and of course, the ubiquitous Mario-based games (and any other number of titles; those are just some of my faves that readily spring to mind).

Still one of the finest games out there.

As for computer gaming, the first thing I ever remember was playing Solitaire on a babysitter’s computer in the early 90s. She quickly regretted letting me play that one time, and would have to pretty much bludgeon me daily to get me to go do my homework instead. Once we finally had our own computer, I got hooked into the first Civilization, Wolfenstein 3D, Settlers 1, and any other number of games. Heck, I’ll still play them here 20 years one, these games of my childhood. I’m actually really slow to add new games to my repertoire, as I consider the sign of a good game that I want to play it and not stop playing it… which is why I chronically have something like The Sims and/or Minecraft up.

My husband also got an early start on gaming here in the UK. He’s currently happily engaging in the revisioning of his childhood love Elite, and got me hooked on Telengard when I moved over here. Our courtship was me getting him to join me in Diablo II; after all, the couple that games together stays together. As we are nearing a decade together, and while we might not necessarily play the same games together, gaming and sharing in our gaming with each other continues to be an important facet of our relationship (marriage and friendship).

Of course, this is a love we share with our children. While Littlerbit is too young to catch the wave at 3 months, Lilbit wants to be ‘like Mommy!’. While I don’t play racing games that often, she’s very fond of them in addition to ‘my’ games. I’m well pleased that she is having fun, and hope that her generation are as fortunate as us children of the 80s in not being told that gaming is ‘not for girls’. Considering that the majority of gamers ARE women (and I’m staunchly against genderizing anyways), I don’t want her or her sister to be harassed for doing what they enjoy.

And really, whatever the game, gaming certainly has its benefits. My hand-brain coordination is superior to my anything-else-and-brain coordination from long years of gaming in various mediums. It’s an outlet for frustration, for creativity, for relaxation, and so many other things. Of course, most people know this by now except for a few killjoys who are convinced that gaming causes mass murders and desensitization to life in general. For me and my broken brain, it helps to keep myself distracted and amused. That goes for most of my hobbies though, hee hee. But as they’re newer, I figured this would be the one to chat about at the start!